I’ll never forget the day I first realized my place. My place in life, my place in town, my place in my family that day still lives with me every day of my life. We were having a party at my house, just a family reunion. It was a cool November evening, and I was full of anticipation. As I fixed my hair alone in my room I just kept saying to myself,
“Look at me! They’re all gonna be proud of me! I’m over four-foot-three, and I’m ten already!” I had a lot to be proud of. I was the first girl to be captain of our ice hockey team, I was doing well in school, and I was even on student council this year. We’d be graduating from Sousa in June, the first fifth grade class ever to do that. I tied my hair back and pulled my cap down on my head. I looked at myself in the big mirror on the wall next to my sister’s bed. I was amazed at how old I looked. Sure, everybody was gonna be talking about my accomplishments. Just like last year, when they spent the night talking about my brother Joe and his SAT scores and all the colleges he was being accepted to, and how Varsity baseball was going all the way this year with him as their pitcher. I saw how proud they were of him. This year, they were gonna be proud of me.
The evening went by pretty smoothly. Everyone had commented on how tall I had gotten and how pretty I looked. With the exception of Poppi, my Italian grandfather, everyone was impressed with my accomplishments. He saw all I had done as incomplete, like it coulda been better. He didn’t speak much in English, even though he knows English; he’d rather be speaking Italian. He never liked the “English way” of doing things. He also didn’t like my family much, ‘cause we were part Irish.
It was nearly dust when my cousin asked,
“Alycia, you wanna play some roller hockey?” Everyone had heard him, I couldn’t say no. So we set up teams; my brother, my sister, and I on one team, and my cousins Chris, Stef, and Maria on the other. My uncle Vini was the ref. The game was a good one, every goal was countered, every minute was important. The score was two-two when Vini called sudden death.
“Next shot wins!” he yelled. Dinner was almost ready, they had to cut it short. We got set for the face-off, Nick and Chris in the center, Liana and Stephanie on the left and Maria and I were on the right. I backed up slowly; very difficult to do on rollerblades while going uphill and trying not to let on that I was going backwards. I managed. The play began, Nick got the puck and passed it expertly to me. He was better at this game than I could ever be. I turned quick and crossed the puck to my sister who went forward. I jumped Chris’s stick as he tried to trip me and glided over to my sister’s right side. We got up close to the goal, but just before my sister took her shot I saw a stick come up from behind. It was Chris. He was determined to win. He pulled the puck toward Maria, who went back towards our goal. My sister and I followed her up. She passed to Chris, it was up to me now. I went for the puck. I could save the game. I came around his left side and reached with my stick. One more inch and I’d save the game. I caught sight of my brother’s face as he stood in goal. It was the last thing I saw before my face hit the pavement. A hockey stick lodged itself between my ribs. It wasn’t mine. I recognized it as my sister’s. She had knocked into me. I felt blood dripping from my face as I watched the puck slide into the goal. I got up and heard my Grandfather speaking to my aunt. He said something about my mother I didn’t understand then he pointed my siblings and I out one by one counting in a strange mix of English and Italian
“Une, two-oh, threde, they are miserable half-breeds, not true Italiano. They are Gli sbagli.”
Gli sbagli. Those words have stuck with me every day of my life. They are burned into my thoughts. I haven’t played a single game of ice hockey since that day. I don’t play my cousins in roller hockey any more. I hardly play at all. I hear him say it over and over. I hear those words every time I walk out my door and lay eyes on that stretch of road in front of my house. Every time I see that scar on my face from the fall, every time I snap on my blades or pick up a hockey stick I hear him. “Gli sbagli” See, in Italian, “gli sbagli” means “The mistakes.”
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